Samia Shahid murder: British Muslim woman alleged to be ‘honour killing’ victim was strangled, Pakistan police say

The 28-year-old's family insist she died of natural causes while visiting relatives

Samia Shahid died while visiting relatives in Pakistan

A woman whose husband claims she was the victim of an “honour killing” was strangled, Pakistani police have said.

Samia Shahid, from Bradford in West Yorkshire, died while visiting relatives in her ancestral village in the northern Punjab region of the country.

Her family have said she died of natural causes, but her husband Syed Mukhtar Kazam believes she was killed because the family did not approve of her marriage to him.

The couple married in Leeds in 2014 after Ms Shahid left her first husband, a cousin from Pakistan, to be with him despite her family’s disapproval.

Ms Shahid’s family have denied any involvement in her death.

The News newspaper, in Pakistan, said a forensic report has confirmed that she was murdered.

It said the report “stated clearly that her death had been caused due to suffocation, as she was stopped from breathing”.

Last week, Mr Kazam claimed there was a 7.5in bruise on his wife’s neck and he had seen a copy of a post-mortem report.

He said the 28-year-old had moved to live in Dubai with him last year but had made trips to UK to talk to her parents about her relationship.

She visited Pakistan after she was told her father was ill, he added.

Mr Kazam said she was healthy and he did not believe her death could have been due to natural causes.

He told The Guardian he had begged her not to go to Pakistan as he “could see it was a lie” but she did not listen.

A friend in Bradford told the newspaper Ms Shahid had been pressured into marrying her cousin in Pakistan in 2012 after the match was arranged when she was young.

It was expected that her cousin would apply for a visa to live in the UK but she eventually left him and returned alone.

Her family were said to have not accepted the divorce and reported her missing to police in November 2014 when she left for Dubai to be with Mr Kazam.

Additional reporting by PA